Friday 24th November: 4 Chombo Shared by 2 Players!

Just as we were thinking about trying another mahjong parlour in Noda's absence the old boy signalled his return to Hiroshima by sending out enquiries about tonight's game so we agreed to return to Kodama.

And the evening was marked by Jaime's continuing revival despite a brief look at negative figures in the second and third games and by David's continuing decline and by Noda's recovery of form and by Kenyon's loss of form despite a brief look at positive territory in the third game.

The evening started with David tucking into his chow and giving away a foolish 1-Characters which also happened to be a Dora tile to Jaime - a Jaime wait if ever there was one, fiendishly designed to catch a chap out over his dinner...

Oh yes, and for pure entertainment value we ought to note that two of the players committed two Chombo each during the course of the evening, Jaime at the beginning and the end and David in the middle.

David had reverted to the "Oh-I'm-knackered-and-losing,-better-drink-as-much-as-I-can," strategy which, up to a point, has its merits but is also fraught with danger...

By the fifth game David had reached the depths so that he could hardly concentrate on the game at all but somehow or other the tiles seemed finally to come together while he was Oya and he declared Riichi - only to discover that one of the tiles he was waiting for - 5-Coins - was lurking in his discard row. Actually, he knew it was there but had misread his hand. Oh well, off we go again... David builds a remarkably similar hand and, certain of his wait, declares Riichi again - only to discover that he had plucked the 6-Coins instead of the 8-Coins from his hand to declare Riichi with, thereby rendering his hand null and void - Chombo!

However, in the last game David was again Oya and found himself building a promising hand that suddenly yielded fruit - another Riichi, this time which no mistakes... Tsumo, Suuanko!

That hand lifted David off bottom spot for the first time all evening, and dumped Kenyon into the mire.

However, with Jaime's continuing recovery refeulling his confidence, the bottom is now as tight as, well as tight as a very tightly shut sphincter indeed!

Jaime +33,* -37, -12, +28, +53, -16,* = +49
Noda -3, +49, -10, +6, --, -- = +42
===
David -30, -10, -12, +1, -36,** +55 = -32
Kenyon --, -2, +34, -35, -17, -39 = -59

*Chombo
**An unprecedented double chombo!

David Hurley
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